Albany-Adirondack Pregame Notes

What you may need to know (or be reminded of) before the Devils and Phantoms square off at Glens Falls Civic Center for the second time this week:

-Season: This is the 9th of 12 meetings in the Time Warner Cable Cup series, with both teams taking 4 wins. Last matchup was on Sunday afternoon in Glens Falls, with the Phantoms taking a 4-3 win to even up the series. After tonight, 3 more meetings: March 29th in Albany, and April 1st and 6th in Glens Falls.

-Standings: The Phantoms begin the day tied for 7th place in the East Division with Syracuse, carrying a 21-32-3-6 record and 51 points. They stand 3 points behind 6th place Albany, who check in with a 25-34-1-3 record and 54 points. They stand 19 points behind 5th place Binghamton for the last playoff spot in the Eastern Conference (at this point Binghamton is a crossover in the Atlantic Division).

-Scoring: No changes at the top of Adirondack’s scoring list since the Devils were their last opponent on Sunday. Denis Hamel leads the way with 37 points (20 G, 17 A), Erik Gustafsson is 2nd with 36 points (5 G, 31 A). It’s anyone’s guess who will start in net, Johan Backlund took the win on Sunday while Michael Leighton took the loss on Saturday. The pattern seems to be rotating starts, so my guess is Leighton in net. On the home side, not much change at the top either. Matt Anderson continues to pace Devil skaters with 47 points (20 G, 27 A), second is Adam Henrique with 40 points (21 G, 19 A). Jeff Frazee is out for the weekend with a finger injury sustained in Wednesday’s morning skate, so I am expecting Mike McKenna to be in all weekend. After Jeff Lerg came up from Trenton to backup Wednesday night, he and Dave Caruso have switched places.

Game time: 7:30 PM. I will be making the trek north and have the usual…